"Thin Ice" by Mark Bowen
The world's premier climatologist, Lonnie Thompson has been risking his career and life on the highest and most remote ice caps along the equator, in search of clues to the history of climate change. His most innovative work has taken place on these mountain glaciers, where he collects ice cores that provide detailed information about climate history, reaching back 750,000 years. To gather significant data Thompson has spent more time in the death zone--the environment above eighteen thousand feet--than any man who has ever lived.

Scientist and expert climber Mark Bowen joined Thompson's crew on several expeditions; his exciting and brilliantly detailed narrative takes the reader deep inside retreating glaciers from China, across South America, and to Africa to unravel the mysteries of climate. Most important, we learn what Thompson's hard-won data reveals about global warming, the past, and the earth's probable future.http://www.amazon.com/Thin-Ice-Unlocking-Secrets-Mountains/dp/0805064435

I'm about 1/3 of the way through. It's a bit of an adventure tale, with the mountain climbing and venturing into different cultures and such. But it also has a very readable history of the science of climate change.

If you want to know the science without having to wade through actual scientific articles, this is a good one. Very true to the way science works, including politics, funding, the mini-cults and the weird personalities involved.

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"Capturing the fanatical enduring love of a scientist for his work, wars and pettiness amongst
terrestrial 'big-thinkers,' and heroic failures and success in the most forbidding and spectacular
places on our planet, Thin Ice is more revealing than The Double Helix."
Dr. James E. Hansen, Director, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies

"Superheroes, unconquerable courage and towering intellect at deadly altitudes; it would be a
great bigger-than-life novel--if it wasn't all true. A thrilling scientific adventure, Thin Ice
just happens to be about an issue that stands poised to change the course of human history."
Carl Safina, author of Eye of the Albatross and Song for the Blue Ocean

Can you be suggesting that I want to know the actual facts about climate change (global warming)?

My mind's made up. Don't confuse me with the facts.

"All I suggest is a man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest" ~Paul Simon

Can I use "I don't wanna hear them lame*ss, egghead, science lies."(?)

LOL! Damned facts, they do tend to confuse people, don't they? Wasn't there a Bush quote to that effect?

Quote:OTOH, what if the book is interesting and fun to read?

Shockingly, it is. I tore through another 100 pages last night. I've not been in a reading mood for the past, oh, year or so, but now I am!

Some of the good tidbits: stories of how these crazy scientists got themselves and all their shit onto the top of 18000+ ft peaks in South America, China, Russia, and Africa. Tidbits about the politics of getting funding. Fights between scientists in Europe and America. (Really, I don't know where the deniers get this idea that the scientific community is capable of working together in a conspiracy. Science is a big long-term catfight, really.)

There was an excellent history of the development of climate science from the 1800s on, including the personalities, the mistakes, and the clever creations. The kid who built a CO2 measuring device to check lake acidity, and his project ended being the station that's been measuring CO2 in Hawaii since the early 80s. The reason for the "global cooling" scare in the 70s. The many misinterpretations of published articles.

There's a long section about societies on the Altiplano in the past few thousand years, and the way they came and went based on weather. Their cool agricultural plans.

The Altiplano story is compared to the rise of California, and the battles for water that are already starting all over the US. He's touched on the disastrous policies of Reagan and the Bush's, and the long pokey fingers of the energy companies (see that thread Magons starter)

The author has promised some "Into Thin Air" like takes of disaster on Kilimanjaro, though I think (and hope) it'll involve a lot less dead people than what happened in 96 on Everest.

It's just a really good book. My mom gave it to me some time ago, and I just finally picked it up because I've lost my home internet.

Doh - gotta go catch my train!

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Quote: (Really, I don't know where the deniers get this idea that the scientific community is capable of working together in a conspiracy. Science is a big long-term catfight, really.)

Science, in most if not all fields, has its camps, those who lean one way or another, and even with in those camps, there's infighting. But in all honesty, even the term 'deniers' is ridiculous, prejudiced and smacks of those who'd deny the holocaust. In their zeal, some AGW types have even gone so far to make it a CRIME to disagree w/ the idea that man is driving or even influencing the global climate.

" I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. "

Okay, I'm hooked...gonna check it out. There's a movie out with the same name, isn't there? Had me confused, because I think it's about something altogether different.

Mal4! I've missed you I've missed you I've missed you! Hang around a while, nice to talk to one of those who has a BRAIN...maybe what with you and Chris and others showing up again, we can ignore the idiots and have some GOOD threads, eh? One can always hope...

Well, I've completely lost the home internet, so I don't know how much I'll keep up with things. I do check in occasionally, but since I skip past all the crap that you know I skip past (did someone post just above yours? My eyes didn't take it in...) there often isn't much to reply to.

Definitely give this book a try. I'm so entertained and informed by it. And a little inspired - it's nice to see how science works, observations building on each other until the truth is revealed. And it's truly amazing how much undeniable truth there is climate science.

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Quote Oonjerah: "Can you be suggesting that I want to know the actual facts about climate change?" <= sarcasm
(I'm actually trying to break the sarcasm habit. But I wanted to prime the pump on this thread.)

AGW <= advocate/advisor/aggravator? of Global Warming? I'm one.

I haven't been scientific about it. Too lazy & uneducated.

There's a big hole in the ozone -- any argument that it's not man made?
The fish are contaminated with mercury: evidence of rampant pollution by us.

I see with my eyes most of the USA glaciers are down to nubbiny ice patches.
I see with my eyes gray-brown smog hanging over all of Los Angeles.

Global warming is a fact. Cyclical or not, we do contribute to it. Denial is foolish.

"All I suggest is a man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest" ~Paul Simon

ETA: Can those people afford to assume it's just another, cyclical drought?
In the short term, they just need to go get some water, enough to keep the towns alive.
In the long term, they, and we, need a more reliable supply. Applies to California.

Oonj, applies to SOUTHERN California. If they weren't syphoning off so much of OUR water with their goddamned canal, we'd be just fine. We still are, compared to them. Water is a big problem between So. Ca. and neighboring states; I won't go into it, because it's DEFINITELY one thing I have against them. (So. Ca., not the other states)

Hubby has worked as a science advisor for a major university in LA for 30+ years. Every time someone brings up the idea of a scientific conspiracy, he laughs his *ss off. Scientists are cutthroat competitors. If you punch holes in a major theory and manage to ram it up your competitor's *ss sideways, that's more grants for you. Anyone who thinks otherwise hasn't come within spitting distance of how science works.

Quote:Originally posted by Oonjerah:
In that case, my only hope is that Richard Branson will offer $25M to
anyone who can cost-effectively convert ocean to fresh water. :(
Didn't someone in Europe already do it?

So, has anyone looking got started reading this book? I'll probably read it again this summer, since I tore through it so quickly the first time. Really, I think it's as good a summary of climate change science that you'll find. Even if, as the author explains himself, it's all hand-waving. (It's very well referenced, so the reader can go beyond hand-waving if they like.)

I find it especially interesting that this book is from a sub-group that counters the cult of the poles. ie, many (most?) climate scientists think all the answers, and all the extreme weather, is at high latitudes near the north and south poles. This is science in Plows, Plagues, and Petroleum, which I've referenced in threads here.

The book I'm talking here - Thin Ice - is about a guy who looked elsewhere, at ice in the tropics. The Pole Cult though he was nuts, and later had to eat their words, apologize and give him props. (Sig - since you live in this world, you must know what a big deal that is! The little guy goes rebel and proves the big names wrong. Such good science drama!)

Thin Ice also has some harsh (but oddly respectful) criticism of the guy who champions the North Atlantic current thing-ma-bob. You know, the "conveyor belt" of warm water that makes the east coast and Europe so nice and warm, the one fictionalized in The Day After Tomorrow. I feel like a bit of an asshole that I never thought about it, but the North Atlantic is really not a very big part of the Earth. Seems so much more sensible that the cycles in the Pacific, like the current reversals that cause El Nino and La Nina, are behind the big climate changes.

There's a really interested description of how climate changes wiped out civilizations in South America, and how this relates to the entire Pacific, and the monsoons, and on over to African weather. It's a bit mind-blowing.

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Do you want to know what top climate scientists really think of climate change?

They think we've screwed the pooch. They've given up technology on getting us through this mess. No more proposals for carbon sequestration, no nifty gizmos, no minor life-style adjustments, no easy way out. The word apocalypse comes to mind.

James Hansen is a NASA scientist who delved into global climate change after investigating why Venus was so hot with Dr Van Allen (yes, THAT van Allen, of the van Allen radiation belts). Dr. Hansen wrote his first paper on global warming in 1981. He explained how his testimony was later changed by the White House, how NASA's scientific censorship was justified by removing the first line of NASA's original mission statement. To understand and protect the home planet"

He traces the extra energy being absorbed by the oceans, the ice, the earth. Using new information gathered by ARGO (a program of over 3000 freely-drifting temperature/ salinity buoys in oceans around the world) he calculated the extra energy the earth is absorbing every day- the net heat gain- thanks to greenhouse gases. This energy, he says, is like exploding 400,000 Hiroshima every day, 356 days per year. The extreme droughts, the exceptional floods, the killer storms are a product of global warming. It's not a future problem, it's here, now.

His talk is here:

It's urgent and depressing. In private, he says there is no hope, but he keeps on trying to reach people because of his grandchildren. Please watch the video.

A science journalist has also weighed in. Gary Stix is an editor at Scientific American. He's revised his previous statement, made only six years ago in a special single-topic (energy) edition of Scientific American. What he now says (referencing a policy article in the more prestigious journal Science) is:

Quote:Almost six years ago, I was the editor of a single-topic issue on energy for Scientific American that included an article by Princeton University’s Robert Socolow that set out a well-reasoned plan for how to keep atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations below a planet-livable threshold of 560 ppm. The issue came replete with technical solutions that ranged from a hydrogen economy to space-based solar.
If I had it to do over, I’d approach the issue planning differently, my fellow editors permitting. I would scale back on the nuclear fusion and clean coal, instead devoting at least half of the available space for feature articles on psychology, sociology, economics and political science. Since doing that issue, I’ve come to the conclusion that the technical details are the easy part. It’s the social engineering that’s the killer. Moon shots and Manhattan Projects are child’s play compared to needed changes in the way we behave.A policy article authored by several dozen scientists appeared online March 15 in Science to acknowledge this point: “Human societies must now change course and steer away from critical tipping points in the Earth system that might lead to rapid and irreversible change. This requires fundamental reorientation and restructuring of national and international institutions toward more effective Earth system governance and planetary stewardship.”
…. Unfortunately, far more is needed. To be effective, a new set of institutions would have to be imbued with heavy-handed, transnational enforcement powers.....

If I were to be able to listen in on the thoughts of my freeway-compatriots, I'd probably catch snippets of anxiety about work, March Madness, gas prices, the kids, the spouse, the asshole who just cut him off... nothing reflecting the problem we're facing.

Quote:Originally posted by Oonjerah:
In that case, my only hope is that Richard Branson will offer $25M to
anyone who can cost-effectively convert ocean to fresh water. :(
Didn't someone in Europe already do it?

Never forget what this man is. You keep forgiving him his trespasses and speak to him as though he is a reasonable human being. You keep forgetting the things he's advocated. If you respond to this man again, you are being foolish.

Quote:Originally posted by SignyM:
Do you want to know what top climate scientists really think of climate change?

They think we've screwed the pooch. They've given up technology on getting us through this mess. No more proposals for carbon sequestration, no nifty gizmos, no minor life-style adjustments, no easy way out. The word apocalypse comes to mind.

Well, I think you need to be more specific about time scale. Apocalypse makes for nice Hollywood, but I think using such terms doesn't help the cause. Yes, we've tipped the scales, but saying "apocalypse" makes the mudbloods think of "The Day After Tomorrow". I don't hear any scientists saying that will happen.

I think it will be messy, but will continue to happen slowly and the effects will be indirect, or not what we expect. And that will keep the deniers in denial. So I prefer more moderate language.

I mean, I don't disagree that the effects may be dire eventually, so much so that I'm relieved not to have progeny to deal with it. Though I do have young students. Hopefully, I'm training them to save the world.

OK, I'm in the middle of the fantasy baseball draft, so it's really hard to concentrate on climate change.

(That was meant to be ironic.)

Quote:James Hansen is a NASA scientist who delved into global climate change after investigating why Venus was so hot with Dr Van Allen (yes, THAT van Allen, of the van Allen radiation belts).

Yes, I met Van Allen. I almost went to college at Iowa State when he was there, so I would have worked with him.

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Quote:I think it will be messy, but will continue to happen slowly and the effects will be indirect, or not what we expect.

To the people of Joplin, climate change did not come "slowly". Nor did it come "slowly" to Pakistan, which was cut in half by record floods, or the people of Russia who suffered through an exceptional drought, heat wave and massive peat bog/ forest fire. Coastal Alaskans are seeing their villages sink into the water (melting permafrost). Did you listen to Hansen? Droughts and dust storms worse than the Dust Bowl.

And, to cap it all off, the possibility of a significant, catastrophic change is still in the cards. For example, a huge chunk of the Greenland ice sheet going splooch! into the ocean and causing a tsunami that would wipe out the northern European coast and a lot of the East Coast of N America.

Quote:And that will keep the deniers in denial.

The deniers will ALWAYS be in denial. Look, there are people who- even today- believe the earth is flat and some who believe it is only 6000 years old. No amount of facts will change their minds.

Quote:So I prefer more moderate language.

Why? What we say or don't say, what does or doesn't happen makes no difference whatsoever to deniers. So why should we moderate our language, especially when what is being described is extreme?

Yanno, as I have alluded to before, one of the REASONS, although not the primary, for moving to Michigan in the first place was this exact problem.
Not that we won't see an impact here, but not on the scale it'll hit elsewhere, I knew damn well the Gulf Coast was gonna get reamed first too, just on common sense - not to mention livin in Tex-ass just kinda sucked.

Quote:Moreover, archaeologists have pointed out that ancient Mayan societies may have been vulnerable to collapse by their very nature. They apparently funneled wealth to a small ruling elite topped by hereditary divine kings, who had virtually unlimited power but whose subjects expected generosity — a string of military defeats or seasonal droughts could greatly damage their credibility. The stability of this system was further threatened by polygamy among rulers, spawning numerous lineages that warred against each other, overall generating conditions ripe for collapse.

For all the window dressing on top of it, underneath all the polite little lies we tell ourselves so that we don't have to face the ugly truth, on a socio-political level we're STILL working on a model that is essentially Feudal in nature, and while *any* system, properly administered, can function - the essential "deal" in Feudalism is that the peons are protected and fed by the Lords in exchange for the rampant exploitation, but when the exploitation continues, reaches a degree where they're NOT being fed and protected...

What happens next is as inevitable as the tide.

So there's that, on top of the climate issue, and I firmly suspect there will be a rebalance via us blowing our own society and tech base to hell and gone, most of it - and while I know you grit your teeth every time I assign motive to Nature, which I ain't really doing so much as giving a name to certain variables, how I CHOOSE to look at it (perspective, rather than pushing motive as fact), I suspect ole Nature is gonna help that along, sure it will - via denial of resources, you watch.

Arizona lawmakers appear close to sending to Gov. Jan Brewer a tea party-backed
bill that proponents say would stop a United Nations takeover conspiracy but
that critics claim could end state and cities’ pollution-fighting efforts and
even dismantle the state unemployment office.

A final legislative vote is expected Monday on a bill that would outlaw government
support of any of the 27 principles contained in the 1992 United Nations Rio Dec-
laration on Environment and Development, also sometimes referred to as Agenda 21.

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